Netflix’s Sweet Tooth producers Jim Mickle and Beth Schwartz are concerned that the show’s pandemic setting will discourage audiences from watching past the first episode.
Adapted from the comic books by Jeff Lemire, Sweet Tooth‘s storyline is set in motion by The Great Crumble, a mysterious pandemic that wreaks havoc on the globe. “It was always the plan [to begin the show that way] because we shot that in 2019, so the pilot was all done well before COVID,” said Mickle, speaking to ComicBook.com. “I think there’s always that concern that people might skip the tiny little piece of the show and miss everything that comes after, because really that’s just the diving board to launch into much richer show about many other things. So, hopefully they don’t.”
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Created, written and illustrated by Lemire, Sweeth Tooth was launched by DC Comics’ Vertigo imprint in Sept. 2009. Its plot follow Gus, a nine-year-old human/deer hybrid who’s raised by his religious father in a seclude nature preserve in Nebraska following The Great Crumble. When his father dies from an unknown illness, Gus is set adrift in a post-apocalyptic world full of people who fear and hunt hybrids like him. Fortunately, he soon befriends Tommy Jepperd, a hot-tempered former hockey player who accompanies Gus on his adventures in this strange new landscape.
For Netflix’s Sweet Tooth, Mickle said he and his fellow creatives tried to make it clear how terrifying The Great Crumble really was with the show’s opening. “I think we always wanted to look at it as, this could easily be a horror movie. We tried to do it with a way that had a little bit more of a fairytale feel, even before COVID. So yeah, if anything, COVID just allowed us to just shorthand a little bit more and not do as much exposition.”
Most of the series is centered on Gus’ journey with Tommy, as opposed to the horrifying pandemic that gave rise to Sweet Tooth‘s setting. “Hopefully when [audiences] get to the part with the hybrid babies, they’ll see that this is a very different kind of show,” Schwartz added.
Sweet Tooth stars Christian Convery, Nonso Anozie, Adeel Akhtar, Aliza Vellani, Stefania LaVie Owen, Dania Ramirez and Neil Sandilands, with Will Forte and James Brolin. The series premieres June 4 on Netflix.
Source: ComicBook.com
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